InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Little of life goes as planned"

Aaron Jacobson {willful child} (backoff) wrote in bellumlogs,
@ 2009-12-11 22:11:00

Entry tags:

red riding hood, willful child

Who: Aaron & Boyd
What: A date for breakfast.
Where: Starts at Boyd's apartment.
When: The morning after this (the day of the anon post), which is actually immediately after this, as unlikely as that is.
Warnings: None... yet?

As he climbed slowly up the stairs (he didn't trust elevators if he could help it), Aaron wondered whether it was a good idea to leave Shiloh alone. All that calm confidence was a comfort to be around, but it also confused his senses, clouded the water, made it hard for him to be absolutely certain unless he was actually in physical contact with him. That was rare, for Aaron, extremely rare. He could feel emotions everywhere, and even the faint but detectable sense of belonging he felt while he was inside of the building seem to come off the floors and the carpet, like dust, as he walked down the tenth floor hallway. He hadn't gone more than one door before he was already flat against the wall on the opposite side, putting as much distance between himself and the door to #1002 as possible. It helped. A little. He walked quickly down the hall, past 1003, 1004, 1005, all of which he knew immediately were vacant.

He blinked and frowned at #1006, then blinked again. There was so much lust in there, it was practically leaking through the walls. Aaron sort of liked lust, usually. It was an uncomplicated emotion. It was all the other stuff that got mixed in that made it uncomfortable. He stood there a minute, lost in thought, and then finally shook himself out of it. Well, whoever was in there certainly had enough "other stuff" to complicate things, even if they had sex all the time. Aaron was glad he didn't know them.

Continuing past, Aaron looked over the door to #1007. It looked like all the other doors, of course. The first zero was a bit tarnished, but other than that, there was no discernible difference to the unpracticed eye. Aaron had more than his eyes, though. He put up one palm and ran it down the surface of the door, a full inch from any contact with the wood, just for a moment.

Fear. Lots of it. The unthinking panicky kind, the one with sharp spikes. It almost overwhelmed everything else.

Aaron dropped his hand. Everyone has stuff under the surface, he thought, trying to fight off a sigh. What sucks is that I can't just have the surface bits without dealing with the rest of it.

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	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 12:01 am UTC (link)
	She liked his grin; it suited him. She curled her legs beneath her and wrapped a hand around the headboard again, clearly very interested in this topic of conversation. "That takes us right back to the beginning, don't it? What do you like about a girl? Not about what she looks like. That stuff don't keep no one, I've learned. I mean inside, what do you like?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

backoff
2009-12-13 12:22 am UTC (link)

Did they have to have this conversation in the bedroom? Seriously? "I don't know," he said, nervously, to fill time before answering. "Everybody has things inside. I can't make people into what I like. They're too complicated." He put his teacup down on the saucer and looked around for someplace to put it down. "So I guess... I have to like people all the way through."

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	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 12:29 am UTC (link)
	She smiled at that answer, because, in her experience, everyone wanted everyone else to be exactly how they thought they should be. "How is it you realize people are complicated, darlin? Aren't boys supposed to stop at the surface?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

backoff
2009-12-13 12:42 am UTC (link)

Aaron chewed on his lower lip for a little while, looking into her face for a little while more. Then he took a really deep breath, looked at the ceiling, then gave her the chance to the question he already knew the answer to. "If... if you really want to know." Because she would figure it out eventually, and he already had realized he wasn't likely to be able to enjoy himself in that frilly bed of hers anyway.

He stood up and crossed the room until he was right next to her. Swallowing self-consciously, he took a breath and said, "Just... don't move, for a minute. Okay?"

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	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 12:46 am UTC (link)
	She had no idea what he was up to, but she didn't fear him in the slightest. So, she didn't move, just as he asked. In fact, she closed her eyes trustingly, and she tilted her face up to him. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

backoff
2009-12-13 01:13 am UTC (link)

Slightly amused: "You don't have to close your eyes." He put one hand up close to her cheek, never quite touching, but so close that you could almost feel the same sensation as a static charge. Gently, he moved his palm through the air just under her chin, and then, after a very long moment, took his hand away. "You're afraid a lot," he said, hesitantly, not because it wasn't true, but because he thought she might now want to hear it. "You want somebody to fix it." His expression was a little downcast, not quite meeting her eyes. "But I think it might be too deep."

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	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 01:18 am UTC (link)
	She opened her eyes when he began talking, and her eyes looks confused, unsure. "What's that mean, 'too deep?'" she asked. It was the first thing that came to mind, that question. Not why or how, but an unspoken not true, not true, which screamed silently. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	backoff 2009-12-13 01:23 am UTC (link)
	He licked his lips uncertainly. "I mean... it's too deep for someone else to fix it. I think you might have to." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 01:26 am UTC (link)
	That calmed the screaming in her mind, because it implied that it could be fixed. With that calm, came the realization that he had just known something he shouldn't have known, and she looked up at him with open curiosity. "How'd you know them things?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	backoff 2009-12-13 01:27 am UTC (link)
	His fingers, hanging loose by the long seam of his jeans, flexed, and he shook his sleeve down over them. "I dunno. I can just feel it. They come off of people's skin and get everywhere." He smiled a little. "Sort of like really strong perfume." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

ex_sanguine300
2009-12-13 01:37 am UTC (link)

Boyd was the last person in the world to question someone seeing or feeling something that wouldn't be considered normal by the mainstream, and she reached out a hand to touch him, but kept from actually doing it at the very last moment. "Is it worse if you touch? And what's that like for you, sugar?" she asked. It was clearly a question founded in real interest, not idle curiosity. "You ever tell doctors 'bout this?" she asked, with a quick glance to the pills on her dresser.

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backoff
2009-12-13 01:58 am UTC (link)

"Worse?" He examined the word. "Stronger... and different. More." A little hopeless shrug. "It's hard to explain it. It's always been like that, I think it would be like you explaining to me what it was like to be able to smell if I couldn't." He moved back before her hand even got halfway toward him.

"My dad took me to some doctors when I was little, for check ups and stuff. He told me not to say anything when we went. Then I stopped going when I got older."

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ex_sanguine300
2009-12-13 02:04 am UTC (link)

Boyd thought about the Family, about what they would do with someone like Aaron, and she nodded, her expression serious. "Your daddy was wise, sugar. If you've got it in you to see into men's hearts, there's people would use that." She didn't explain that she could count off over a dozen off the top of her head, but it was obvious in eyes that were too old for her age. "So, would touching me be bad?" she asked, noticing how he moved away from her hand.

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$Aaron Jacobson {willful child}: :\$

backoff
2009-12-13 02:15 am UTC (link)

"I'd know that kind of person when they got close," Aaron said, a bit too nonchalantly. Nothing truly terrible like that had ever happened to him, and it was a bit hard for him to conceive. It wasn't stupidity, it was just kind of... a possibility too distant for him to make out.

"Not... bad," he said, visibly gulping. "I just... you know what it's like to be you. I mean, really be you. Think like you. Feel like you. And if I touch you then... then I would too." It was not the most romantic thing he could ever come up with, but he had a suspicion most people didn't like being dissected like that.

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ex_sanguine300
2009-12-13 02:21 am UTC (link)

Rather than scaring her off, that intrigued her. "Would it bother you, though? Hurt, I mean, if it ain't good inside my head?" She thought for a moment on his first statement as she waited for his answer, and she spoke again before he had a chance to. "You may see 'em coming, sugar, but that ain't going to stop them from getting their mitts on you if they have an inclination."

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	backoff 2009-12-13 02:32 am UTC (link)
	Truthfully, Aaron wasn't sure he wanted to answer that question anyway. His head twitched a little bit to one side. His sleeve was still loose over his hands, but he could feel something anyway. "You're worried. This is someone you know?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 02:37 am UTC (link)
	"A lot of someones," she admitted. She didn't come across as feeling guilty about it. It was just a fact, in her mind, what the Family did. She didn't have any personal connection to anything they did; she only had regret and love for everyone in the Family that had been killed. "You didn't answer, sugar." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	backoff 2009-12-13 03:01 am UTC (link)
	Aaron found that reaction disturbing, and it was quite obvious. How can you know people like that, and not be disturbed? She wasn't even too worried about it. He shifted on his feet. "A lot of the time contact sort of makes me stop being me, since I'm so... well. You. Or whoever." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 03:05 am UTC (link)
	Her expression went immediately soft. "Oh, I'm sorry, darlin. That must be harder than can fit into words," she said, then looked at him straight on, at his obvious reaction to her confession. "Don't you know folks who do bad things?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	backoff 2009-12-13 03:11 am UTC (link)
	The sympathy made him uncomfortable. "No," he admitted. "Not personally. I felt them before though." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

ex_sanguine300
2009-12-13 03:16 am UTC (link)

She gave him a look that made it clear she would have reached out and touched him then, if she could. "Oh, baby, don't be like that. I didn't mean nothing by it. It weren't pity, if that's what you were thinking. I know what hard's like, and I wouldn't want pity from no one either," she explained, then looked at him with an intelligence past her years. "You willing to listen to something from a girl who's been 'round more than you have?"

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	backoff 2009-12-13 03:27 am UTC (link)
	Aaron didn't say anything. For the first time, he kept his mouth shut, jaw firm. He understood that Boyd knew more than he did, but she was also very raw on the inside, and she seemed... vulnerable. He nodded slowly. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

ex_sanguine300
2009-12-13 03:32 am UTC (link)

She slid off the bed, and she made very sure to stay clear of him as she walked into the kitchen and served herself a flute of sparkling water. It was really just an effort to steady her nerves, and she looked out the window when she came back.

When she looked back at him, it was with a serious gaze. "Darlin, you might not think nothing of coming up here and telling me what you can do. And I ain't going to tell a soul. But you gotta know that people can't be trusted out of the blue like that. The folks I work for, they'd take you and lock up, sure as the grass is green, if I told 'em 'bout you. Now, I ain't gonna, but you didn't know that when you told me. You can't do that, baby. It ain't safe."

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	backoff 2009-12-13 03:39 am UTC (link)
	"I did know that before I told you," he said. "I was close to you. I came in your house. Everything you feel is all over the stuff you touch. You live here. It's everywhere. You are everywhere." He smiled, confident. "I trust you." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	ex_sanguine300 2009-12-13 03:43 am UTC (link)
	"And no matter how trustworthy I am, you can't know that if I'm being tortured, I won't point someone straight to you, sugar, if the hurting's bad enough," she explained. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)